Infiltrating the Illegal Wildlife Trade: A Trafficker’s Downfall

Most people can name at least one organized-crime figure, but if you ask them to name a wildlife trafficker, the majority come up short. Investigative reporter Bryan Christy wants to change this by putting a face to the crime so that wildlife trafficking is treated like narcotics trafficking or any other organized crime. With the support of National Geographic, Christy goes after one of the most sought-after international wildlife traffickers, Anson Wong—and the publicity Christy gives Wong eventually aids in the trafficker's downfall.

The National Geographic Live series brings thought-provoking presentations by today’s leading explorers, scientists, photographers, and performing artists right to you. Each presentation is filmed in front of a live audience at National Geographic headquarters in Washington, D.C. New clips air every Monday.

Ask anybody to name an organized wildlife trafficker. No one
had a name. I wanted to change that. I wanted to put a face on international
wildlife crime I wanted to treat international wildlife crime the same way we
treat narcotics trafficking the same way we treat Mafia and other forms of
organized crime. These guys behave that way.

National Geographic called me and said “Hey, we've read some
of your stuff. Look, if-- we

want to do something on Asia's wildlife trade, if you could
do anything what would you do?” I said, “I'd go after Anson Wong.” “What do you
need?” “Leave me alone. Leave me alone, give me a year.” And they did. They
didn't pay me either but... And so I moved to Florida and started working at Strictly
Reptiles. Now, Strictly is owned by Mike Van Nostrand. He is a convicted wildlife
trafficker. And I was interested in his story. Mike's father, Ray Van Nostrand
was part of the Tabraue narcotics organization that controlled Miami's cocaine and
marijuana trafficking for years in Miami, during the Cocaine Cowboy years if
you-- if you remember those years. I'm working at Strictly Reptiles writing a
book called The Lizard King I'm unpacking shipments from Anson Wong. I know his
address. Anson Wong is a wildlife trafficker.

You ask anybody in the world to name an organized crime
figure and chances are they can do it. We know our American Mafia figures. We
know Al Capone, John Gotti... But ask anybody, until this guy to name an
organized wildlife trafficker, no one had a name. I wanted to change that. I
wanted to put a face on international wildlife crime I wanted to treat international
wildlife crime the same way we treat narcotics trafficking the same way we
treat Mafia and other forms of organized crime. These guys behave that way.

Anson, he lives on this island on the west coast of
Malaysia. If you look very closely it is a turtle-shaped island. He's also a
guy who was trafficking at the time all the things we care about when we think
about precious wildlife. He was offering snow leopard pelts, rhino horn, he was
moving live elephants. He had a tiger farm in Vietnam where they raised tigers killed
them, mounted them as taxidermy specimens sold them as trophies for people to
put in their living rooms. He had this Spix's Macaw. It's a bird that's
supposed to be extinct in the wild. Anson was offering three for $100,000
apiece. The US Fish and Wildlife service considered him in the 90s the biggest
international wildlife trafficker in the world. They launched an investigation called
Operation Chameleon. It was their special ops, sole operation for five years largely
targeting Anson, and it was successful. The way they got Anson was they told
him-- they lured him to Mexico, believing that he was about to setup a network
to smuggle-- to kill bears in Canada, cut out their gall bladders smuggle those
galls and bile to Malaysia where he-- where they would sell them for Asian
medicine. They caught him in Mexico with the help of Mexican authorities. He's
arrested, extradited to the United States sentenced to 71 months in prison. He
gets out. The US Fish and Wildlife service considers it one of the most
successful cases in their history. When he got out of jail, he went immediately
back to the reptile business. I also know from talking to reptile traders he
was never out of business. While he was in jail, his wife was trading for him.

So, we came up with another operation we called it Operation
Big Ego. Operation Big Ego had the idea that let's circle Anson. Let's get-- I
can't I'm not Fish and Wildlife, I can't deal with him I can't buy reptiles
from him, trade with him. All I can do is try to make him want to talk to me. And
I've never met him. I don't even know what he looks like. And he does all the sorts
of trafficking you're familiar about-- familiar with... knowing what you know about
drug trafficking. He also does some ingenious things. He arranges... for guys
to smuggle reptiles into Malaysia and then arranges for them to be arrested. He
has his smugglers arrested the animals are seized by the government. The
government says, “Oh, we've got this rare animal. We need to find a rescue
center for it.” Anson has a zoo. “We'll take it to Anson Wong.” Anson Wong then
gets the animal and legal paperwork from the government. Then he can trade it. So,
I learned his techniques and then I went to Indonesia where his major customers
and competitors are and I lived on a reptile breeding farm and met as many of
his competitors and... clients, as possible. Then I flew to Malaysia. And I
didn't know what Anson looked like. I said-- I walked into the shop, 22-B,
Jones Road and I-- there are two Chinese guys standing in the doorway I said,
they said... “Can we help you?” I said, “Yeah, I'm looking for Anson Wong.” And
then the same guy said, “I'm Anson Wong.” I said, “Oh, I'm Bryan Christy.” He
said, “I've heard of you. I hear you're writing about Strictly Reptiles. What
you should really be doing is writing about me. I'm much bigger.” And that... is
when Operation Big Ego really took off.

And he, and he said “not only that but look” and he slid a
stack of blueprints across the desk to me. I said, “What's this?” He said, “A
tiger farm. I'm building a tiger park here on Penang Island. And the government
is funding me.” So, this is the world's leading wildlife trafficker arrested in
the United States. He returns, his own government funds him to build a tiger
park this is a guy who is trafficking in tigers. I said, “I have a story.” But
that's not enough to me. The lawyer in me said, “How did he get away with this?”
And that's where National Geographic starts to get momentum. I mean, that's
where working for National Geographic changes things. Cause any other magazine,
any other periodical would say “That's a story, bring it home.” I said, “No, I
want know legally how he's able to do this.” And it turns out one government
official's career rose with Anson's. Same location, selling location and then
headquarters... I included that in the story. Big risk. But I went to meet her.
I was warned before I walked in “Look, she hates Americans and she thinks
anytime an American comes they just wanna ask

about Anson Wong so be careful about that.” I said, “Oh,
okay.” So, I walked into her office. She said, “Hello, nice to meet you.” I
said, “Hi, I'm an American, and... I'd really like to talk to you about Anson
Wong.” And she said, “Oh, he's my good friend.” Now we have a full story.

This is where, where facts sort of start to merge with how
you tell a story. The strategy we came up with is let's structure this like an
umbrella. Bryan you tell the shaft that's a, that's a strict investigation. Mark
Leong, photographer with me would tell the story of exploitation of wildlife. And
Mark's photographs include tigers, pangolin. These are fresh water turtles. This
animal is having its teeth removed so it won't bite its owner as a pet. This is
the bear bile industry. This bear is alive, just sedated. The bird market in
Indonesia. This is where your Gucci and Prada bags and things come from. No one
had ever been inside like that before. This is shark finning, which is still a
major, major problem. And we put that together... The story was called The
Kingpin. And, it was an intentional restructuring of story-telling. It was the
cover story in, this is Korea most countries around the world. Not the United
States... Bastards! But here's the impact. This story ran in Malaysia. Within
weeks law enforcement officials raided Anson-- Anson's facilities they stripped
him off his business license his license to move endangered species. Anti-corruption
agents raided the... the office of the enforcement officer I had written about.
Members of parliament took that literal magazine and held it on the floor of parliament
and demanded change. Malaysian parliament passed the first new reform legislation
for wildlife in 40 years. That summer, Anson was... because he's cheap, I guess
moving boa constrictors in a suitcase through the airport on his way to
Indonesia, the lock on his suitcase broke. And, normally that would be no
problem for Anson Wong. But this story had been reported in Malaysian press. And
Anson was arrested. And he was tried and convicted sentenced to six months in
prison. The public outcry over a six month prison was so great that the
government effectively appealed its own victory retried him and he was
sentenced to five years in prison. A massive penalty... in any country in the
world. The prosecutor and the judge held up this story and said, “This is what
we're doing.” This is the reality of wildlife crime. And if you're not prepared
for this if you're not prepared for this... you're not gonna be able to make a
change. How do we address this? To me it is story, it is moving from victim-based
story-telling to villain-based story-telling. Let's focus on the villain. And
when you do that, people have a sympathy ceiling. They can only absorb so much when
it comes to wildlife crime. If you accept that, use that as a given, move past
that and turn these into true crime stories, true stories that you would expect
to hear when it comes to the Mafia. Which these guys are.

Infiltrating the Illegal Wildlife Trade: A Trafficker’s Downfall

Most people can name at least one organized-crime figure, but if you ask them to name a wildlife trafficker, the majority come up short. Investigative reporter Bryan Christy wants to change this by putting a face to the crime so that wildlife trafficking is treated like narcotics trafficking or any other organized crime. With the support of National Geographic, Christy goes after one of the most sought-after international wildlife traffickers, Anson Wong—and the publicity Christy gives Wong eventually aids in the trafficker's downfall.

The National Geographic Live series brings thought-provoking presentations by today’s leading explorers, scientists, photographers, and performing artists right to you. Each presentation is filmed in front of a live audience at National Geographic headquarters in Washington, D.C. New clips air every Monday.